drafted and—”
“No, everyone thought he was getting drafted. The whole division assumed he was getting picked up. We all thought he was going,” I interrupted, wanting to make my point crystal clear.
“Yeah, I know. Everyone thought he was getting drafted,” Mac repeated, mimicking my tone.
“But what happened?” I asked, my jaw clenching so tight that I thought I might give myself a headache from the pressure.
“He didn’t get the call,” Mac said as he started walking again, and I followed suit.
“Right. He didn’t get the call. And then what?” I baited, knowing exactly what came next in the story because I’d thought about it a hundred times before.
“Then, he couldn’t play the next season because his grades were so bad that he wasn’t eligible. There wasn’t anything he could do to pull them up in time, and he lost a whole year of eligibility. His last year.”
“Exactly.” I never took baseball for granted. Nothing in life was a sure thing until it was actually happening and you were living it. Until then, fate could change her mind and completely fuck you over at any time. “Bubba thought he was getting drafted, so he stopped caring about his grades. Didn’t make them a priority. And when that didn’t pan out like it was supposed to, he lost his scholarship and his spot on the team. I will not be a story like Bubba Watkins. I refuse to be a life lesson whispered about for future Fullton athletes.”
Mac blew out an annoyed sound. “Oh, come on, Chance. Bubba Watkins wasn’t talked about on ESPN the way you are. He wasn’t rated in the top ten national rankings or on every scouting leaderboard across the country.”
“That doesn’t mean anything.” I shook my head, not wanting to sound like a dick because to guys like Mac, it did mean something. It meant everything to the players it wasn’t happening to.
But that type of publicity was exactly the kind of thing I couldn’t afford to pay attention to. If ESPN talked about me all the time, I didn’t need to know about it. I couldn’t care. That stuff made guys lose focus. It stopped being about the way you played and turned into being all about what the network was saying. Ego had a way of ruining things for not just athletes, but also people in general. Which was why I maintained strict focus on my game and pushed all the rest to the sidelines.
“Wonder if that means something,” Mac said with a nod, and I glanced in the direction he’d indicated before my stomach twisted at the sight.
Danika was walking hand in hand with some guy. Jared, I assumed. Her boyfriend. The girl wasn’t mine. She didn’t belong to me. Yet here I was, standing with my hands clenched into fists like Jared was touching something that didn’t belong to him. I wanted to rip his hand from hers.
“I told you she had a boyfriend,” I said, trying to sound unbothered, but holy hell, I was worked the fuck up.
Jared’s hand moved to her lower back, inches from her ass, and I saw red like a madman. She smiled up at him, and they stopped walking as she pointed toward the entrance of a building. Nothing made any sense. Not my reaction to this, not the way I was feeling inside. Nothing. I was not this kind of guy. I didn’t do things like this. I didn’t feel these types of ways.
“You look really happy about that,” Mac said with a laugh as he pointed at my fists. “Thought you weren’t into her?”
“I’m not,” I bit out before I unfurled my hands. “I barely even know her.”
“Uh-huh. Let’s go.” He punched my arm before pulling on my shirtsleeve. “Carter. Walk.”
I did as Mac had demanded, moving in slow strides, still torturing myself by watching as Jared pressed a quick kiss to Danika’s lips. She walked away from him without looking back. He walked away from her like he had somewhere else to be. I squinted as I tried to focus in on his face.
Why the hell did he look so familiar?
Not Friends
Danika
Chance was being distant. He and I had been in this room for five minutes, and we’d barely spoken more than two words. He seemed angry. Or annoyed. No, he definitely seemed angry. It rolled off him like waves of energy, filling the room.
“Why are you being weird?” I asked because there was so much distance between the two of us that he